Throw Me Away
by Poe2
Summary: "Those near Vegeta should've heard it. He lived for her, he pined for her. And yet the world was deaf to his love."
1. Chapter One

Throw Me Away

By Poe

Chapter One

            "_Sir, something's wrong. _

_            Excuse me?_

_            The continuum, our readings are incalculable. Perhaps an error with our computers, but more likely, an error in space itself._

_            If there's a problem, you fix it. That's you're job. Must I remind you?_

_            No, Sir, of course not. But if these readings are correct, well…_

_            Yes?_

_            It would take a god to fix it."_

            Pan cringed as a slam erupted from the temple. Vegeta was angry again. He only seemed to come to the temple in foul moods, and that wasn't exactly what the temple was built for. She supposed it had become her job to deal with this nonsense, so the best thing she could to was set her shoulders back and prepare Se-Aila for her task. Certainly a more unappealing one than Pan's job, but she couldn't help but complain to herself.

            She sighed, and slipped out of the room, through the woven blue tapestry, and out the heavy, solid wood door. Pan knew where to find Aila, she was always in the same place around this time. Once the War came, Pan thought it would disrupt rituals like this around the temple. But the temple was built for this, an unchangeable void in Vegetasei, evading the lives of everyone in it and forcing them to become ceremonious and compulsive. 

            Pan lifted the tapestry to Se-Aila's door, and then placed her hand on the doorknob.

            "Pan, come in," Aila said. In the temple, the elite could detect anyone's presence from miles away. Pan adjusted the sash around her arm and slipped into Aila's chamber. 

            Aila stood facing the shrine in the corner, gripping the edges of the wooden table. Pan knew this was sacrilege, but Se-Aila could be hardly discouraged. 

            "You heard, Se," Pan said, "Vegeta is having another one of his mood swings."

            "That's Master Vegeta," Aila hissed, and Pan could sense from her voice that tears were in her eyes.

            "Aila, I know that it's hard and everything, but if you're not going to do your job-"

            "Se-Aila! It's Se-Aila! Where are your manners? You know, a foreigner from the Commonwealth like you should be groveling to be given a position like handmaid. Locals work for years to get where you are, and this kind of disobedience will not be appreciated."

            Pan clenched her jaw. "_Master_ Vegeta is here. You wouldn't want to keep him waiting."

            Aila spun around, eyes red with tears, and glared fiercely. "You enjoy this, don't you? Seeing me whore myself to that… That pompous madman! And it doesn't help that he's had his eye on you, either!"

            Se-Aila was renowned for her jealousy, she always seemed to suspect Vegeta was sleeping with everyone in the temple. She had even hung a cook for giving  "questionably immoral" glances. 

            "Aila, calm down, Vegeta doesn't want anything from me but respect. It's a game to him. He wants what I would never give him."

            "And why not? He gave you so much, why don't you just respect him as he wishes?" Aila protested. Pan knew that Aila was asking this, because she had abandoned so much for servitude, and received little in return. Although Pan often returned Se-Aila's anger, she knew that Aila had her reasons. 

            "You don't understand, do you?" Pan questioned, "You can't, you're a concubine! He can't kill you, he can just get rid of you, and then you can just be a concubine for someone else. I'm just a Handmaid, we're disposable. I can't give Vegeta what he wants, or he'll have no use for me. Besides, how can I respect a man like that?"

            A spark of shame seemed to kindle in Aila's eyes, a shame of recklessness. Soon, however, her mood soured once more. "You take your worthlessness for granted. Be thankful all you have to do is cut vegetables and clean fountains. I study all day subjects that are both undesirable and difficult, and then at night, I have sleep with that intolerable lunatic whenever he wants."

            "You knew that when the War started and you signed the oath. Well it's too late, now? And you know he's waiting-"

            "I know he's waiting, _slave_, I don't have the brain of a child. Fix my hair quickly, and get my sash. Have you cleaned it?"

            "Yes, why do you dress so nicely for this? Your clothes are just going to come off."

            "Just get my goddamn sash," Aila said, seating herself by the dressing area. Pan grabbed the combs and sighed, she hated fixing Aila up. It was such a petty waste of time.

            She took a handful of Aila's red hair as a welcomed silence settled over the room and ran the comb through smoothly, not snagging on a single knot. Aila spent so much time on her hair, it was almost perfect, and Pan almost suspected it would fall out later in her life. Pan, meanwhile, just brushed her hair, put it up, took a quick bath in the servant's room, and was ready in 20 minutes at most. Pan and Aila were near opposites, but had spent so much time around each other that they had almost developed a friendship. Not much of one, however. 

            "Hurry, Pan, the Master will be furious. And don't forget to make the tea, you know how the Master likes it." Pan brushed her hair faster and wondered dimly how Aila could go from referring to Vegeta as an "intolerable lunatic" to "the Master". 

            Pan finished brushing, and took a slight handful of hair, twisting at the end and pinning it up with the comb. She had to continue doing this until all of Aila's hair was properly pinned, and it was certainly a tedious chore for Pan. The silence was becoming painful as the job reached its end. She walked over to the end table and grabbed Aila's sash, walking back over and handing it to her.

            "Good," Aila said, taking it and tying it around her arm, "Don't you dare forget the tea."

            Pan nodded grimly, and watched Se-Aila get up, check herself in the mirror, and adjust her sash. She took a deep breath, stood up straight, and then turned to leave. Pan watched her go and a sting of jealousy throbbed in her heart. 

            Of course she did not envy Aila's twisted relationship with Vegeta itself, but that she had one. Vegeta was untamed; he didn't want a woman like Aila to fetter him. If only Pan could be with him, it was a sick thought, but there was something so attractive about him.

            She stood up and shook her head. What would Vegeta want with her? Pan was a replaceable slave and disobedient, for that matter. Her life was hanging from thread and Vegeta liked it that way. The fact that Vegeta had given her a job in the temple was giving her false hopes, he didn't care for her, and he just wanted the position filled. 

            And Aila had much more than Pan had, she was far more attractive than Pan. She was well groomed, ladylike, and docile if she wanted to be. Aila had been educated intensively from the age of three until her current age of twenty-seven. She was almost Vegeta's intellectual equal, despite the fact that he was forty-five.  Naturally gifted with logic and intuition, she had earned a place in the academy that allowed her to by considered as a concubine. The only thing she lacked was Pan's innocence, and her inability to show respect. What could Vegeta see in that?

            Pan walked over to the mirror and frowned. She never took care of herself, she managed to look wild yet plain in her uniform, sullen yet childlike, and hopelessly clueless about the ways of the world. 

            Pan brushed her hair back into place, and sauntered over to the door leading out of Aila's preparation room. She could think about these things all she wanted, but now was time to make tea. 

            Aila left Vegeta's chambers as she usually did, with a calm visage but clearly storming on the inside. Who knew what turmoil lay beneath the surface. Pan watched her leave and didn't think much of it as she held the steaming pot of tea. Aila didn't even look at Pan, but that was expected.

            Pan shrugged internally and approached Vegeta's room. She hated going in there after he was with Aila, nothing would change except that he would be in bed with no clothes. It was certainly an awkward situation, and Pan would usually just set down the tea and leave quickly. He would normally look at her the whole time, which made Pan even more uncomfortable as well as confused. After a while she just assumed he did this with everyone in order to intimidate them.

            She balanced the teapot with one hand and opened the tapestry with another. Pan remembered that he could sense her presence and that if he didn't want her there, he could just say so before she entered, but he did not say anything. She opened the wood door and entered, her pace picking up a bit as she noticed Vegeta sitting upright in his bed. The blanket was draped around his lower section, and his chest was, of course, exposed. Pan set the teapot down next to his bed, and then the teacup, avoiding eye contact with him.

            She looked up quickly at him, and he was staring at her as usual. Vegeta had a gaze that certainly was intimidating, and almost inescapable. 

            "Is there anything else you want?" Pan asked, almost angry. 

            He smirked. "That's Master. You had better watch your impoliteness or I could have you sent to the countryside."

            Pan grumbled something under her breath and poured the tea, purposefully overflowing the cup. 

            "And actually, there is something I want from you, if you can believe it," Vegeta said. This surprised Pan a bit, but she quickly overcame her surprise.

            "What is it? Cake with your tea?"

            Vegeta laughed, cruelly. "It is not a task that can be so easily accomplished."

            "Oh?" she asked, planting her hands on her hips. What was he proposing?

            "I don't, however, think this is the best time to discuss it." 

            "When would be a time to discuss it?" Pan asked, a bit ashamed at her curiosity.

            "Tomorrow. In the garden, by the eastern fountains, where we can't be heard."

            She knew those fountains well. After all, she was in charge of cleaning them once a week, as so cruelly mentioned by Aila. "What this about? Can you at least tell me a little?"

            Vegeta's gaze narrowed. "It's very simple, and I should hope that when I tell you there will be no need to explain anything. Is that clear?"

            Pan mumbled a yes, a shade angered because he would not tell her anything. "I'll see you in the garden, then," Pan said, not too enthusiastically. 

            Vegeta nodded, and then turned his attention to the window. Pan sighed internally at the irony of the situation. This was the most curious conversation she had all week and it was coming from an attractive, and oddly enough, naked warrior covered only by the thin sheet of his bed.

            As she headed out of the room, Pan couldn't help but wonder, was this the moment she had waited for? She dismissed the thought quickly. She was, after all, merely a servant. 

Author's Note: Wow, there's a lot to be explained. This fic has a future, I'll tell you that much. If you want, review with complaints, comments, compliments, or whatever, it'll get me writing faster. Thanks!


	2. Chapter Two

Throw Me Away  
  
By Poe  
  
Chapter Two

_"He pressed against her, she could feel his skin, so much of it, and the blood warm in his body. A wound formed at her side, where a metal part of his uniform bit into her skin. She didn't dare say anything as pain engulfed her, soothed her with its continuity, calmed her with its reliance. _

_His mouth was slick and hot, his hands were pushing into her. His soul, she could feel it crawl out of him and into her, the evil of his love diminishing a part of her. His body was a vibrant sin, ugly poetry, cheap champagne. He seemed to throb, to waver between existence and fiction, to suppress resistance with mere presence. He was the brushstrokes in a painting, hidden for hundreds of years by skilled artists, and now clear on a canvas. Set free. _

_He was a weed in a world of beauty, dug earth in a garden, an unfinished tombstone. His hand smoothed the nape of her neck, at first almost to calm her, and then to hold her head back so he could kiss her. She could feel him enjoying the kiss, feeding from it. She wished she could hate this more. But it was a moment where you could not feel, or know what you were feeling. It was so much of nothing, and so much of what she did not know. _

_It was a memory for a short time, and then it was gone. _

_Only he could remember. He remembered everything."_   
  


Pan scrubbed the inside of the fountain with the steel wool, the blanket of green algae coming off in disgusting chunks. How Pan hated cleaning fountains. Because chemicals were sacrilege inside the temple, even for medicinal purpose, the bowl of the fountains that were immersed with water was conveniently coated with a layer of algae. Fuzzy, stringy, one-celled torment. 

It was also strangely convenient that Vegeta had requested to meet at this fountain. Pan was scheduled to clean the fountain that day, and she was sure to continue working until the time of their meeting. It seemed almost planned, but Pan knew the real reason Vegeta had chosen that location. Privacy.

Pan thought about this as she scrubbed the fountain, sure to scrub until her hands were raw and reeked of steel. The inside of the temple was heavily monitored. Every word you said was recorded and every room had a camera in it. The only place on temple grounds that escaped monitoring was the gardens, but only for religious purposes. The bathrooms were located there, coinciding with the symbolism that the gardens were a private area. 

Escaping temple grounds were impossible, and not just because of the monitoring. The garden had a prevention field around it, an electrical, invisible wall that would kill anyone who tried to cross it, even accidentally. There were three separate backup supplies of electricity in case something were to happen with the electricity, and guards posted at certain exits. The only person allowed to ever leave and enter freely was Vegeta. The cook was allowed limited exit and reentry, but only once a week to buy the food for the week. If the cook bought spoiled food, diseased, or inedible food, there would be no food for a week. Vegeta was carefully scanned during entry of the temple, he was not allowed to bring anything.

Supplies were replenished every month by the guards, who were high-ranking military officials, and that was all. The one place that was secluded from the guards eyes and cameras, was this spot near the fountain.

And soon she was to meet him. The sun was already an orange blur on the horizon, the time between their meeting was ticking down to minutes. What could he possibly have to say to her? What could this be about? She was just a slave, an amnesiac who had no past and with only serfdom as her future. What could Vegeta want with some poor, lost girl missing her memories?

"Fuck her, I'm sure she remembers everything. Those coy looks she keeps giving me, I know her lies," Vegeta thought to himself as he buttoned the collar to his uniform. He was heading back to the temple and changing back into informal wear, it was customary for a man of his stature to change outfits many times during the day. "Like a leaf changes colors" was the saying, and it meant that a prince who made up his mind was no good. 

"I'll have to discover for sure, I can't afford to base more anger on assumptions, however logical they may be," he assured himself, taking an outward glance at the shiny metals of honor hanging from his wall from long, satin ribbons. He even thought like a warrior, everything had a battle plan. Now he was off to meet with Pan again, but was she ready for her proposal?

He took a look at his room and almost sneered into the camera. The Watchers, they were called. His silent enemies. The film continued reeling, his thoughts secret. If only The Watchers knew his thoughts, it would certainly make their day. Oh the dirty secrets he held, the untold stories he had so brilliantly hidden from those bastards.

            But he hated to think of the past. Because it was at that moment, as he finished fastening on the metal of his uniform, that a memory fell onto him like acorns into a pond. 

            "I hate you," she had said, and he could feel her hand on the back of his neck. She was lying, he swore to himself. She had said that while he was taking off her clothes, and she hadn't done a thing to stop him. She kissed him back. She bled for him. She clung to him as though the dirty things they did were throwing her off a cliff, and like she did them because she loved him with desperation, with passion. 

            Not because she was lonely. 

            No, it couldn't have been. Everyone was lonely, every act had an aforethought of loneliness in that part of Vegetasei, but this was different. Vegeta remembered pushing her against the wall, his mouth on hers, his hands liberal. She plagued him after that, even Aila, his own concubine, could not satisfy him. Aila even knew it, Vegeta's time with her was strained. Vegeta could only think of her. 

            Vegeta knew these games with her were necessary, but he could hardly stand it. He wanted every inch of him on her, she could cloak him from pain. Vegeta would feed off her, drink of her soul, recede into her. Vegeta would become her. 

            If only things had gone a different way, then all this foolishry would stop. Vegeta did not know how much longer he could bear it. Keeping a secret was one thing, keeping one that destroyed you was another. He could almost hear it, the winds whispering it to him, the hush of the swaying trees spreading the words across the branches. It was so fucking obvious, but only he could see it. Written across the skies, around clouds, emblazoned on waters, adrift on ocean currents. 

            "Pan," the world would call, "Pan and Vegeta. Once together, now nothing."

            Se-Aila would sleep with Vegeta, the people of Vegetasei would celebrate it, but all around them nature screamed. They were all so foolish. Those near Vegeta should've at least heard it. He lived for her. He pined for her. 

            The world was deaf to his love. 

            And so was she.    

             Vegeta took a long, hard stare into the camera of The Watchers. Look at me, you bastards. You can't possibly know my past, no one will. Do you honestly expect to steal from a thief? My will is going to triumph, even if my love kills it first. 

            Take a good look, because that's all you have.

            And with that, he made his exit, leaving the room quietly, descending into a sun setting world. Fate was adrift this evening, destiny was an approaching messenger. Like the chill of winter conquered Autumn, whispers of the future were sailing on the universe's torn cloak. One red and orange sun, one forgotten past, and a future that was anything but certain. 


	3. Chapter Three

Throw Me Away

By Poe

Chapter Three

Author's Note: Yeah, this is short, but I hope the fans will appreciate some kind of update. To make up for it, the next chapter should come out sooner, and be longer. For encouragement, please review. Thanks!

            Pan was almost done scrubbing when she flinched. She always seemed to flinch when someone was coming, it was like she just knew if they were near, like she could feel their presence. Expecting Vegeta, she turned around and dropped her scrubbing cloth at the bottom of the well.

            It wasn't Vegeta.

            Instead, Se Aila loomed over her, her pretty face heavy with an angry disposition.

            "You!" she snapped at Pan, grabbing her by the ear like an unruly child.

            "Huh? Let go! What did I do now?" Pan responded, trying to pull out of Aila's reach.

            "You know perfectly well what you did, now come with me!"

            "What's going on? Let go! I can walk by myself!" Pan said, thoroughly confused.

            "You're to receive severe punishment for what you did! Three days in the Discipline Chamber for you!" Aila said, her voice thick with scornfulness. 

            Pan cringed. She couldn't be serious, could she? The Discipline Chamber was a place where bad servants went, it was a narrow hole just large enough to fit in, with the faintest light coming out of the top of the hole. Servants would be crammed against rough, dungeon-like walls and not be fed for days. Water would be poured into the hole, and servants would be reduced to licking it off the walls. The air would grow humid, and it would become harder and harder to breath. Pan had never been in there before, and the idea was so frightening that she could hardly believe it. 

            "What did I do? At least tell me!" Pan argued, still being dragged by the ear. 

            "The very thought sickens me. If there was a place worse than the Discipline Chamber, I would put you there!"

            "You're not really going to put me there, are you?"

            Aila stopped once Pan said this, and let go of Pan's ear. She grabbed her by the shoulders with a strong grip and forced Pan to face her.

            "What you did was inexcusable. I'm doing you a favor by letting you stay here, a big favor! I should have you killed, no, thrown out on the streets!" Aila said, gravely serious.

            "Why?" Pan pleaded, "What did I do?"

            "Don't play dumb with me! You're going to the Chamber at once!"

            Pan flinched. Someone was coming, but who? "I don't know what you're punishing me for, honestly!"

            "You'll have plenty of time to think about it in the Chamber. Not a word out of you!"

            "Aila, I told you to leave the disciplining up to me," a familiar voice said. Both turned to see Vegeta, standing sternly in his evening uniform. 

            "Master Vegeta!" Aila said, startled, "I only meant to save you some time."

            "Yes, well, I have a better idea than the Discipline Chamber," Vegeta said, looking at Pan with a cold glare. _So this is why he wanted to meet me_, she thought, _to punish me._

            "Of course, your way is best," Aila said. Vegeta ignored her and approached her. 

            "I am here to insure that no one will do what you did ever again. You will serve as an example to the others," he said with a murderous gaze. 

            "What have I done?"

            "Here at the temple, we do not waste time with explanations." Vegeta said, brusque as ever, and grabbed Pan's arm. Pan could sense a look of approval spread over Aila's face. 

            "This is unjust! I have done nothing!" Pan said, with anger, confusion, and fear accumulating until she could feel her cheeks flush and her heart race. 

            "Silence!" Vegeta said, yanking Pan along with no delicacy. 

            "I trust your majesty will not waste sympathy on the brat, as I have all these years," Aila said, smug that Pan was receiving punishment. 

            Vegeta continued without so much as a glance at Aila, and dragged Pan along with him. The grip on Pan's arm was as cruel and unforgiving as the tone of his voice and the expression of his face. She knew he would leave marks on her arm, and she was beginning to think he would bruise her. 

            They came up to a hedge which Vegeta swiftly rounded, making Se Aila conveniently out of sight. As soon as this was so, he let go of Pan's arm and she stumbled a bit at the sudden chance. 

            "You believed all that bullshit, didn't you?" Vegeta said immediately. Pan was instantly confused all over again.

            "Bullshit? What are you talking about now?"

            "Do you think I am ignorant enough to accuse someone falsely? Do you entrust me with such faulty intuition that I would suspect you a criminal of a capital crime?" 

            Pan felt dazed. "Ignorant? Faulty intuition? What are you saying?"

            "Are you missing your brain as well as your memory? I told that whore of a concubine you had committed that crime she suspected you of!"

            "You lied to Aila so I could get punished? Why would you do that?"

            His eyes widened. Vegeta looked genuinely shocked at her question, and Pan had no idea why.

            "You don't remember?" Vegeta questioned fiercely, as though trying to draw out a correct answer with anger.

            "Don't remember what?"

            "Don't play games with me, you had better not be lying!" he yelled, grabbing her sore arm and giving her an accusing shake.

            "Ouch! I don't know what you're asking me! Remember what?" she exclaimed. Vegeta examined her closely, skeptical about the earnest answer.

            "If you continue lying this way I'll be forced to find a way for you to confess." There was a murderous glint in his eye as he hauled Pan over to a small, rather short building nearby, one Pan had noticed but had never been to. Once they were at its entrance, he opened the main door, and with no delicacy shoved her inside, and then followed in, slamming the door behind him. 

            "You don't remember? Not a thing?" he said in a mocking, sarcastic tone. He began to remove his gloves, tugging slowly at each finger until it slid off. Pan eyed him carefully.

            "What are you up to?" she wondered aloud, not too enthusiastically. Vegeta tossed his gloves carelessly behind him and then approached Pan, his eyes narrowing with a hint of what was to come. Pan's breath caught in her throat as he neared and her curiosity welled up inside. 

            "I hated that damn ship, but you were always a good lay."

            "Good lay? Are you crazy? How would you know that?"

            "Oh, so you think you're a virgin?" he taunted, nearing her. 

            "Well of course!"

            "Is this, then, the mark of a virgin?" In a swift movement, he grabbed a piece of her slave's tunic near her inner thigh and yanked at it until it tore. On the skin he had revealed was a scar across the top of the inside of her leg. Her eyes widened at his audacity.

            "How did you know about that?" she stuttered, her eyes fixated on him, but in a reluctant sort of way.

            "I gave it to you, my whore," Vegeta whispered in her ear.

            "How? When? I don't understand." Her voice was so soft Vegeta could barely make it out. He began to run his finger over the scar and Pan shivered.

            "Vegeta," she said louder, "If they catch us…"

            Now his hand was on the inside of her thigh. He moved it up and down and the movement was so erotic it was almost soothing. Pan's lids grew heavy and she found it difficult to stand. The confusion in her spun out of control, but she ignored it, and she even had the strength to ignore everything in her that screamed for her to push him away.

            She realized he was kissing her, there was a numbness in her that was now receding. As she felt his kiss she realized she had been longing for him for so long, and she wished with all of her that the moment would never end. She wanted time to ignore her, to leave her like a dissatisfied lover, and she never wanted to think about her old life again.

            Vegeta pulled away from her and she noticed her breathing had increased significantly. 

            "My whore," he said, his voice thick and dark, running over her like a smooth liquid, "they already have."

            The words did not hold meaning for her until later. Far later. 


	4. Please Read

I've replaced the last chapter with a new chapter, just to let everyone know. Also, FF.net is really giving me a hard time, so if there are any strange errors that pop up you know who to blame. 

Finally, I've started chapter four, but I'm really unhappy with the response I have received so far on this story. I really am thinking about leaving fanfiction.net and I need a lot of support to continue writing this story and posting here. A lot of my friends, justly, have left and never have posted here again. This presents me with a bit of dilemma I hope I can overcome soon.


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